Channeling my inner Patton
(Please listen to this music in the background as you read the post.)
Theme from the movie Patton
I have learned this week a very important lesson:
You can take the girl out of the Army, but you cannot take the Army out of the girl.
Although I graduated from West Point twenty-four years ago and have not worn a military uniform since 1990, the Long Gray Line lives on within me clear as a bell, night and day, no matter what. All I have to do is look inside myself and draw from my core. Or my Corps.
I am by nature shy, quiet, and nonassuming, but when I believe in something I can do what needs to be done. Or give it my best shot.
I remember well the statue of General George S. Patton, Jr. that stood on the edge of the Plain, across from the Library at West Point. I loved the way he stood, holding binoculars in his hands, looking solid and resolute and determined. Like he knew exactly what he was doing.
I think they have since moved Patton, or temporarily relocated him during construction of a new library. And I think he may well be moving somewhere else around the Plain in the near future. A man of maneuver! But one who will be standing tall at West Point for some time to come. Inspiring untold generations of future cadets to service and leadership.
I work in a university library, and I had to call upon the spirit of Patton this past week to guide me in a particularly difficult chore. You might think a library would be a very quiet and peaceful and stressfree place to work, but you would be wrong. A library is like any other organization, full of people who must somehow work with one another to accomplish a variety of missions that ultimately serve its users.
I do not relish standing up in front of a group of people and leading them in a move that many question or doubt or fear. I like to stand up in front of people and teach them or entertain them, but when it comes to convincing them to adopt a course of action they may not totally believe in, that is another story indeed.
But this past week, I was called on to do just that. I was called on to convince my colleagues to adopt a new, expedited process that would help guide them as they establish a more professional organization. Two years ago, the group voted, after considerable contention and hours and hours and hours and months and months and years of meetings and debate, to adopt a promotion process more in line with the promotion and tenure process of the university's faculty. Librarians as a rule don't much like change (even though their field is rife with change!), and this was a huge change. A scary change.
By virtue of my position as the elected representative to Faculty Senate and hence, Chair of the Library Faculty Committee, I felt it fell to me to be proactive and take the initiative, to help develop a process that would move us all further in the right direction. I felt strongly that if we all worked together, we could employ positive peer review and assist one another in preparing for promotion. We were colleagues; we should be helping each other to be the best librarians we could be.
I am not a politician. I tend to be obtuse when it comes to seeing the inner politics and workings of an organization -- and even a library has inner politics, believe me! I always expect people to do the right thing. That is just the way I am wired. Perhaps this is a weakness on my part, or perhaps it is a blessing. If I cannot see the obstacles that others see, then I continue to drive forward.
I went into my meeting this past week pretty much scared shitless. I was expecting the worst: contentious debate, overwrought emotions, the whole nine yards. But I was hoping for the best. I went in prepared, I went in having given everyone documents ahead of time, explaining what I was proposing. I was ready to explain. I was ready to answer questions. I was ready to ask for input. I set a clear agenda, with a set timeframe, and announced that our meeting would end on time (or earlier) and that we would leave the meeting having voted on the resolution I had proposed in my documentation.
To my surprise, everyone was civil, everyone was calm, everyone had good questions, and everyone contributed positively to the discussion. It was a very productive session.
At the end of the meeting we voted. Ten people voted for the resolution, none voted against it, and one person abstained. We created a task force to accomplish some tasks that need to be done before we can fully implement our plan, and we gave them a deadline to report back. We adjourned the meeting on time, and everyone headed off for lunch or wherever they needed to be next.
I was stunned. Pleased. But stunned. I was not sure that I had it in me still. To be assertive and firm in guiding a group to make a decision.
The only thing that could have made it better would have been if there had been a huge American flag behind me and I had been wearing a Patton outfit and ivory-handled pistols and I had talked about crap flowing through a goose.
It is not only on battlefields that we must lead. It can be in classrooms, in meetings, in boardrooms, in our homes, on the street, just about anywhere really.
Anytime, anywhere.
Theme from the movie Patton
I have learned this week a very important lesson:
You can take the girl out of the Army, but you cannot take the Army out of the girl.
Although I graduated from West Point twenty-four years ago and have not worn a military uniform since 1990, the Long Gray Line lives on within me clear as a bell, night and day, no matter what. All I have to do is look inside myself and draw from my core. Or my Corps.
I am by nature shy, quiet, and nonassuming, but when I believe in something I can do what needs to be done. Or give it my best shot.
I remember well the statue of General George S. Patton, Jr. that stood on the edge of the Plain, across from the Library at West Point. I loved the way he stood, holding binoculars in his hands, looking solid and resolute and determined. Like he knew exactly what he was doing.
I think they have since moved Patton, or temporarily relocated him during construction of a new library. And I think he may well be moving somewhere else around the Plain in the near future. A man of maneuver! But one who will be standing tall at West Point for some time to come. Inspiring untold generations of future cadets to service and leadership.
I work in a university library, and I had to call upon the spirit of Patton this past week to guide me in a particularly difficult chore. You might think a library would be a very quiet and peaceful and stressfree place to work, but you would be wrong. A library is like any other organization, full of people who must somehow work with one another to accomplish a variety of missions that ultimately serve its users.
I do not relish standing up in front of a group of people and leading them in a move that many question or doubt or fear. I like to stand up in front of people and teach them or entertain them, but when it comes to convincing them to adopt a course of action they may not totally believe in, that is another story indeed.
But this past week, I was called on to do just that. I was called on to convince my colleagues to adopt a new, expedited process that would help guide them as they establish a more professional organization. Two years ago, the group voted, after considerable contention and hours and hours and hours and months and months and years of meetings and debate, to adopt a promotion process more in line with the promotion and tenure process of the university's faculty. Librarians as a rule don't much like change (even though their field is rife with change!), and this was a huge change. A scary change.
By virtue of my position as the elected representative to Faculty Senate and hence, Chair of the Library Faculty Committee, I felt it fell to me to be proactive and take the initiative, to help develop a process that would move us all further in the right direction. I felt strongly that if we all worked together, we could employ positive peer review and assist one another in preparing for promotion. We were colleagues; we should be helping each other to be the best librarians we could be.
I am not a politician. I tend to be obtuse when it comes to seeing the inner politics and workings of an organization -- and even a library has inner politics, believe me! I always expect people to do the right thing. That is just the way I am wired. Perhaps this is a weakness on my part, or perhaps it is a blessing. If I cannot see the obstacles that others see, then I continue to drive forward.
I went into my meeting this past week pretty much scared shitless. I was expecting the worst: contentious debate, overwrought emotions, the whole nine yards. But I was hoping for the best. I went in prepared, I went in having given everyone documents ahead of time, explaining what I was proposing. I was ready to explain. I was ready to answer questions. I was ready to ask for input. I set a clear agenda, with a set timeframe, and announced that our meeting would end on time (or earlier) and that we would leave the meeting having voted on the resolution I had proposed in my documentation.
To my surprise, everyone was civil, everyone was calm, everyone had good questions, and everyone contributed positively to the discussion. It was a very productive session.
At the end of the meeting we voted. Ten people voted for the resolution, none voted against it, and one person abstained. We created a task force to accomplish some tasks that need to be done before we can fully implement our plan, and we gave them a deadline to report back. We adjourned the meeting on time, and everyone headed off for lunch or wherever they needed to be next.
I was stunned. Pleased. But stunned. I was not sure that I had it in me still. To be assertive and firm in guiding a group to make a decision.
The only thing that could have made it better would have been if there had been a huge American flag behind me and I had been wearing a Patton outfit and ivory-handled pistols and I had talked about crap flowing through a goose.
It is not only on battlefields that we must lead. It can be in classrooms, in meetings, in boardrooms, in our homes, on the street, just about anywhere really.
Anytime, anywhere.
posted by delta at 7:33 PM
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